I think Neuros Tech needs to partner with a bigger co.

[fcassia]

I have long said that the Free World needed an alternative to the VIIV nonsense and the DRM infection peddled by the Wintel monopoly.

I had a lot of hopes in Prismiq for the last three years but the company ended up going under due to a series of bad decisions, and ultimately lack of funds. I know the complete story because I exchanged several e-mails with one of the Prismiq founders and have been the owner of a Prismiq Media Player since its inception in mid-2003.

See:
"Intel's VIIV, victory of what?"
http://geekgaucho.blogspot.com/2006/03/intels-viiv-nonsense-victory-of-what.html

I think Neruos has GREAT technology, but I also think that it needs to learn from history and partner with a BIG company with the advertising/PR budget to make Neuros' products a success. What companies? Well... the companies must be Microsoft-Intel foes ("the enemy of my enemy is my friend"), experienced in battling Goliath.

So I narrowed the choice to two: AMD, and Sun. Why AMD? Well, NeurosTech' s OSD has the potential to become a VIIV killer. Just imagine an AMD logo on the unit and AMD' s marketing muscle on it. AMD could even afford to subsidize it and bundle it with other AMD technology. "get an AMD powered notebook today and get a coupon for $100 off on your next AMD MediaSomething powered by Neurostech!".

Second choice: Sun. Why? Well... Sun and AMD are buddies... Sun is shipping tons of Opterons on its machines and is thus an Intel foe, Sun is also a long time Microsoft foe, with experience in battling a Goliath... remember the "Microsoft Passport" venture and how Sun defeated it by gathering other companies around "Liberty Alliance". Ultimately MSFT thought winning the battle was impossible and dropped the idea of MS Passport as the "standard" for online validation on third party web sites.

Another angle for the Sun interest in Neurostech's OSD... it could serve as a platform to Sun to build on and implement their "cross platform, open DRM" idea. Of course, this doesn't mean that every OSD from Neurostech must support it, just that Sun could market and promote a rebadged Neurostech OSD that implements Sun's "open DRM" idea.

Of course, this doesn't have to be "AMD or Sun" it could well be "AMD *and* Sun partner with Neurostech to promote..."

Think about it for a nanosecond.... it would only take a superb demo of Neurostech's gear to the top brass at AMD and Sun...
It certainly can't hurt AMD or Sun... h*ck they have sunk money in less successful ventures... remember the Javastation 'network computer' or the 'java card' ?

Thoughts? Comments? Expletives?. ;-)

FC

[JoeBorn]

Well, I guess I haven't been hanging out on my corner much lately.  Sorry, I'll do better with that going forward.  I think your idea is pretty interesting, but I feel that first we have to get our product really awesome, and not a "work in progress," it's getting there, but as we all agree, it's not as slick as it needs to be to be a full fledged mainstream viiv killer...

In the short to medium term, I really feel the "big company" to partner with could well be TI.  I say this for a number of reasons, first we already have a relationship with TI, and they've expressed considerable interest in furthering that relationship.  Second, they can bring us (and have a vested interest in bringing us) what we really need now, a bigger developer community.  TI has the leading embedded multimedia solution, and they are actively supporting Linux on it.   Neuros hackers are essentially TI hackers, and they have the industry footprint to bring a lot of attention to our products, software and community. 

[Shadyman]

TI sounds like an interesting group of people with a vested interest in Neuros stuff.